I had a ball eating in Greece. I hadn’t eaten too much Greek food before visiting Greece, but realizing that the Greek cuisine pretty much consists of various forms of meat, I knew it would be a winner.

The next 9 or so days involved eating far more gyros than I’d like to admit. But when they taste that good and cost 2 euro (about AU$3.50!!), how could I pass it up???

The gyros in Greece (pronounced “iros” [… or something like that]) comprise your choice of meat, some salad, tzatziki and chips in a delicious pita bread. I always ordered the chicken, because, to my surprise, lamb gyros weren’t all that common in Greece. I had to leave out the tzatziki (because of the lactose), so it probably wasn’t quite as delicious as it otherwise would be, but it was still pretty darn good.

I found that wherever you went, the gyros were amazing. You don’t need to go to some fancy restaurant to get good food in Greece – and in fact, I think the less fancy, the more authentic.

The two best gyros I had in Mykonos were at Tropicana (surprisingly, given it is essentially a bar) and at Saki’s Grill House (which is known to be the best gyro in Mykonos). The Saki’s Grill gyros were huge and the pita bread, in particular, was to die for. I’d definitely recommend a visit! The Tropicana gyros tasted delicious and could be enjoyed while lounging on the beach soaking up the sun!

Tropicana

Saki’s Grill House

We also decided one night to splurge a little. The BF and I met up with 2 other friends and we went to a restaurant for a feast. Many of the restaurants offer these giant mixed plates to share between 2. We got chicken shashlik, chicken wings, sausages, hamburgers, pita, dips, chips and more. It was 26 euro for 2 people (about $38 for 2) which was pretty good value because we were popping afterwards! Apologies for the awful photos and, no, this wasn’t the full platter.

Our feast

Our feast

The thing I loved about this restaurant [and sorry I can’t remember the name], apart from the delicious and never-ending plate of food, was the ambiance. I remember it so clearly. You sit outdoors in the heat in a giant space cluttered full with tables, people, food and chatter. It was a hullabaloo, an organised chaos, an exciting pandemonium; it was wonderfully atmospheric.

Let me talk a bit about my allergies in Mykonos.

I don’t think that allergies are particularly common in Greece. Generally, when I gave my beautiful Greek nut translation sign, people thought I was a little bit crazy. I’d say that Greek people had a bit more of a blasé attitude towards allergies as compared to those in Italy and Spain, but that was possibly because of the nature of the food, in that there was probably no way that there would be nuts inside a gyro and therefore they thought I was crazy for asking. I wouldn’t say that they were careless about my allergies, but just that it wasn’t taken quite as seriously. I did, however, usually get a better response to my allergies when I was eating at hotel restaurants/bars (eg at Paradise Beach), where the staff are probably more accustomed to dealing with allergies.

This being said, however, I felt like I didn’t need to worry as much about my allergies because it was always pretty obvious what I was eating. You could see the gyro meat being cut off the spit in front of you, or you knew that you were eating plain meat without any sauce. There wasn’t anything snuck in there. I had also done a bit of research with my Greek friend, who gave me the low down, and so I knew that nuts are not particularly common in the Greek cuisine, but are quite common in Greek pastries/desserts (eg Baklava).

What I did love about Mykonos was that I got to enjoy dessert. Say what? OK well not dessert, per se, but let’s just call it that. You’ve all (hopefully) read about my disappointment in not being able to enjoy the exciting desserts in Spain and Italy, which generally consisted of nutty or potentially nutty delights. In Mykonos, when lying on the beach in the scorching sun, a delicious ice cream is exactly what one craves. Paradise Beach has a lovely little set up where you can get just about anything (there are restaurants, bars and also a little canteen-ey type place where you can get all sorts of snacks). I went to go look at what ice cream options they had and unfortunately faced a whole lot of gibberish (Greek) ingredients. Until I found the packaged Häagen-Dazs ice cream tubs – complete with English ingredients. Woohoo!

These were mini tubs and there were heaps of different options to choose from. Whilst there were 1 or 2 that contained nuts (but not peanuts), most of the flavours were nut free. The first one I had was crème brulee, which was beyond amazing. The ice cream had chunks of caramel inside, dripping with crème brulee sauce (which tasted a lot like real crème brulee). The second flavour I tried was the chocolate fondant. Wow was it good! It was chocolate ice cream with chunks of brownie, drenched in chocolate sauce. It was definitely worth cheating on the lactose intolerance front! Who needs an Italian hot chocolate or some sort of delicious Spanish pastry when you have Häagen-Dazs ice cream!? Ok I realise that for most non-Allergians, this isn’t all that exciting and it’s probably no comparison, but I’ll take what I can get.

For the vegetarians – I’m sure you would know to expect (almost) nothing but meat in Greece. There’s always the salad option though, and of course lots of cheese. Being an island, I’m pretty sure there were some fish/seafood dishes/restaurants on offer, but meat was the overwhelming majority.

For those allergic to dairy / the lactards – the Greek cuisine is full of dairy – between the tzatsiki, the halloumi, the Greek yoghurt and the feta, there’s plenty of it. That being said, however, it is easy to avoid these things and you can almost always leave the dairy out. There’s always something else to eat.

Some final words about Mykonos:

Ouzo. It’s the Greek specialty liqueur, more particularly, an anise-flavoured aperitif. AKA, if you don’t like liquorice, do not try this. My friends and I bought a bottle and were told to drink it 1 part ouzo, 3 parts water. I smelt the bottle and (as an avid liquorice-hater) could not bring myself to drink it [I think I was still scarred from the limoncello and grappa in Italy]. The far more daring 3 guys I was with took on the challenge and drank their shots of Ouzo and I got to enjoy the looks on their faces once they were downed. Classic!

This is by far my favourite dessert of all time. Given all my allergies, there aren’t too many delicious dessert options, so I’ve grown up eating my mum’s (Jackie’s) self-saucing hot chocolate pudding. And boy is it gooood. How can something that is nut free, dairy free and soy free taste so damn delicious? Go on, give it a try. It’s pretty easy to make too!

My birthday cake yesterday, made by my mum 🙂

Ingredients:

Cake:

1 cup self-raising flour

2 tablespoons cocoa

30 grams butter or margarine

½ teaspoon salt

½ cup soy milk / lactose free milk / cow’s milk / rice milk

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

¾ cup white sugar

Sauce:

¾ cup brown sugar

¼ cup cocoa

1¾ cup hot water

Instructions for cake:

Sift flour, salt and cocoa.

Add white sugar and mix well.

Stir in milk, vanilla and melted butter/margarine.

Mix until smooth.

Spread evenly into a greased dish.

Instructions for sauce:

Combine brown sugar and sifted cocoa.

Sprinkle over the top of the pudding.

Pour the hot water over the top (I usually add the water gradually as otherwise it often overflows – add a cup at first, and then once it’s been cooking for a while, add the rest).

Bake for 180° for approximately 50 minutes.

For reference, in the image above, this recipe was doubled and served about 6-8.

Coffee-blanca – Part 1 discussed the transformation of the Melbourne coffee scene, where lactose free (LF) milk, almond milk and coconut/rice milk are more commonly making an appearance in cafes, to the celebration of us lactards. But there is a downside to this sweet delicious trend as well.. especially the risk of cross-contamination for nut Allergians. Importantly, there are still not enough cafes serving LF options! C’mon.. we need our coffee fix!

But wait.. there’s more – Coffee-blanca – Part 2:

The coffee mix-up

We’ve all experienced taking a sip of our coffee and discovering we been given the wrong order. Some coffee connoisseurs, like my dad, can tell just by looking at their coffee.

One of the big coffee mix-ups is failing to use soy milk in a coffee. It isn’t an infrequent occurrence for the soy part to be left out. And that’s even after paying up to 60 cents extra for it!

A hot choc at one of my fave cafes, take 2 after they forgot my soy!

This is clearly very risky for those with allergies. Nut Allergians may accidentally end up with an almond milk drink. Or, as is more likely to happen, a cow’s milk Allergian may end up with cow’s milk instead of soy milk.

I have a friend, lets call her T, who is allergic to cow’s milk. Not intolerant. Not mild allergy. More like.. lungs close up and she can’t breath allergy. She developed this later in life, and I find that in such cases, the Allergians tend to be far less neurotic than I (and perhaps most of us who were allergic from a young age). When we go on coffee dates, she orders her soy latte and I tell her to make sure the café knows she is allergic and not just intolerant. This is one of the problems with the trend of intolerances – cafes do not take allergies AS seriously, as they assume you will just get a sore stomach. Which, trust me, is not just a slight inconvenience. I think that when a person orders a soy, LF or almond variety of milk, baristas need to be extremely careful to ensure that the milk ordered is what the customer gets.

Side note: I thought I would mention an interesting experience whilst on the cow’s milk allergy topic. There is a café near my house where I occasionally order a soy hot chocolate. They make delicious hot chocolates. They sprinkle chocolate flakes on top of the froth and at the bottom of the hot chocolate. Doesn’t this defeat the purpose of ordering soy? This isn’t the only café at which I have seen this done. Surely a café should check whether they can use real chocolate where a person has ordered soy? The same goes for the chocolate powder/liquid used to make the hot chocolate – cafes should be cautious as to whether or not the product they use contains milk, and alert those customers who order soy if this is the case.

The sugar spoon

I am really glad that I have a platform from which to write about this. This is one of my pet hates. I am sorry if I ruin future coffee experiences for you.

Coffee shops generally provide sugar in one of 4 ways:

sugar sachets. Fine.

sugar in a tub with a spoon. Fine.

sugar with a special sugar-pouring-friendly lid. Fine.

sugar in a tub with no spoon. Not fine.

It is this option (d) that really gets to me. Perhaps this is me being picky or overly neurotic. But firstly, I find it gross and secondly, it is worrying to me as an Allergian. Sure, 9 times out of 10, a person will take their spoon, put it in the sugar jar, put it in their coffee, and drink their coffee. But where a person decides they need more sugar, or where a person just doesn’t care at all, they will take their wet, possibly-slobbered on spoon and dunk it back into the sugar jar for more. NO!! NOT OK!! Risk levels increase, obvs, where almond milk is served.

I have personally stopped going to particular cafes that only offer this option (d). It is not that hard to provide a spoon.

End rant.

Frequent sipper cards

Finally, this is another topic that I happy to vent about. I am more than happy to pay extra for soy milk or LF milk and I can understand the reasoning for it.

But.

In June/July, I completed a 3-week internship in the CBD. In between Southern Cross station and my office, I stopped by each morning at the same café, Langleys, for my morning coffee. Each morning, I ordered a soy drink, and received a stamp on my frequent sipper card.

Come day 8, it was time for my free drink. Yay! I ordered the very same order as the previous 7 days and gave my frequent sipper card to redeem my free coffee. I was told that while my drink was free, I HAD TO PAY 50 CENTS FOR THE SOY. Say whaaaaat??

I hate it when cafes do things like this. Did they think I was ordering the soy milk to take advantage of the fact that it was free? People don’t just voluntarily order soy milk. I had earned my free soy. 50 cents was not going to have any effect on the success of their CBD cafe, or to me for that matter. But the impact on customer loyalty is huge.